How to improve iPhone battery life

iPhone battery life FAQ: Do you have any tips on how to improve my iPhone battery life (or iPod battery life)?

Yes, it turns out you can do a number of things to improve your iPhone battery life, and I thought I’d share what I’ve learned here.

1) Improve iPhone battery life - Recharge the battery monthly

I learned this tip by digging through the Apple support website. They specifically write that you can improve your iPhone battery life by draining your iPhone battery completely every month. Here's the quote from their website:

For proper maintenance of a lithium-based battery (the iPhone battery), it’s important to keep the electrons in it moving occasionally. Be sure to go through at least one charge cycle per month (charging the battery to 100% and then completely running it down).

I don't do this on a regular schedule, but when I do it, I do notice a difference in my iPhone battery life.

2) Improve iPhone battery life with settings

Beyond draining the iPhone battery once every month, the next thing you can do is to optimize the way you use your iPhone. Here's a collection of tips on how to improve iPhone battery life, both from my own experience and from the Apple website.

Note: With each of these tips I kept wanting to write, "You have to decide whether you really want to use this feature", so rather than keep repeating that, I thought I'd write it just once here.

Minimize the use of iPhone location services Services such as Maps, Twitter, Facebook, etc., all draw from your iPhone battery life. You can disable the iPhone location services by going to Settings, General, and then Location Services.

Turn off iPhone push notifications Apps that use the Apple Push Notification service can have a bad impact on your iPhone battery life.

Turn off push mail If you have a push mail account like Yahoo Mail (or other mail services) you can turn that off, and choose to check your mail manually. Go to Settings, then "Mail, Contacts, Calendars", then "Fetch New Data", and set "Push" to Off.

Fetch data less often Also related to mail, if you have a push mail account like Yahoo Mail (or other mail services) you may be able to configure it to fetch data less often. Go to Settings, then "Mail, Contacts, Calendars", then "Fetch New Data", and change the iPhone setting there (such as changing it to hourly).

Turn down the iPhone display brightness Adjust your iPhone brightness as desired to again improve iPhone battery life. Go to Settings, then Brightness to adjust the iPhone brightness.

Turn off iPhone Wi-Fi when not using it If you're not near a Wi-Fi network you can use, and you have Wi-Fi enabled, I know from my own experience living here in Alaska that you're definitely wasting iPhone battery life. Go to Settings, then Wi-Fi to turn off Wi-Fi.

Turn off the iPhone Bluetooth setting Just like the Wi-Fi suggestion, if you're not using Bluetooth, turn it off. (Go to Settings, General, Bluetooth.)

Use Airplane Mode Really want to save your iPhone battery life? If you're in a remote area (like some places here in Alaska) and you're not getting much reception anyway, put your phone in Airplane Mode. I've seen that this can really save iPhone battery life. Go to Settings, then set Airplane Mode to On.

Beware of apps and videos Depending on what they're doing and how they're written, third-party apps may eat your iPhone battery life. Watching videos can also be very demanding.

It may also help to update to the latest version of the iPhone operating system (iOS). I don't know the details of what Apple does from release to release, but in theory they're making iOS more efficient with each release, and I know from my own use that my iPhone used to get much warmer when I'd use it extensively than it does now (and I'm assuming 'warmer' goes hand in hand with 'consuming more energy').

3) More iPhone battery life information

Before I go, here are a few useful links related to how to improve iPhone battery life:

I hope these tips on how to improve iPhone battery life have been helpful. If you have any related tips you'd like to share, please use the Comments form below.